..the launches will be controlled by a repurposed Senior Care Autonomous Robotic Employee (SCARE) built by Hitachi Heavy Industries, that simply requires a ROM to be reflashed with its launch program, taking only two minutes and a WiFi connection.

It will look glorious, hooked into the launch control board, with its vacuum nozzle attachment and pill dispenser hanging off the side, as it guides the majestic rocket through the night sky.

The USN boomer force was launching sixteen missiles with just twenty odd people as far back as 1960. (Yes, there were other people on the boat, but they were no more part of the launch crew than the crane operators at Uchinoura.) Today, it's twenty four missiles with the same crew.

Sorry, but you failed to mention how many laptops they were using. Seeing as how one of the main points here was that, instead of using huge, stationary appliances, they were able to rely on only 2 laptops to do the job adequately, I feel like what you're saying doesn't really invalidate this launch.

Also, keep in mind that "20 something" is still over twice as many people as 8.

That's why I pointed out today's figures as well - because they have that kind of precision. Not that precision or power are in any way related to the number of launch control crew required in the first place.

The USN boomer force was launching sixteen missiles with just twenty odd people as far back as 1960. (Yes, there were other people on the boat, but they were no more part of the launch crew than the crane operators at Uchinoura.) Today, it's twenty four missiles with the same crew.

Missiles are expendable. A certain percentage (30% or so?) of malfunctions (or simply non-hits) is expected. In space launches, you often have unique cargo, and even though there's insurance, you really don't want to cash it in.

Missiles are expendable. A certain percentage (30% or so?) of malfunctions (or simply non-hits) is expected.

Actually, no. At least on the strategic side of the house, 98-99% plus were expected to hit their targets. (Which is about the same percentage of successes as space launches.) The D5, which has had over a hundred launches, had 100% success.

Yeah, just pretend I typed in what I meant to type in "The D5, which has had over a hundred operational test launches, has had 100% success". (Operational test launches are production tactical missiles, the one that failed was a PEM bird - a non tactical development missile.)

To add to what DerekLyons has posted, the cep (circular error probable, used to be written as C.E.P.) for an RV on the Trident II D5 with a W88 is given as 300-400ft. If memory serves that's considered effective against hardened targets.

The epsilon rocket is a) tiny and b) entirely solid fueled. This kind of high level of automation might not translate well to more complex and larger rockets. Bear in mind also that this is just the launch crew. Manufacturing the rocket is likely still labour intensive.

True, but note that the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket doesn't need a gigantic ground crew at the launch site like you needed with the Space Shuttle. In fact, the crew needed to assemble, test and launch the United Launch Alliance Delta IV or Atlas V rockets are much smaller than they used to be, thanks to much more efficient rocket assembly buildings.

Now considering NASA was doing all of Apollo by hand on a computer that was less advanced than a TI-83 (and that was ground side) then it makes sense.

Actually, NASA had initially several (five?) IBM 7094-II computers and later five IBM System/360 Model 75Js for the Apollo project. I also believe that both sets of machines had some nifty RT extensions both in HW and in the OS. The former ones had about 0.35 MFLOPS, and I think 32 Kwords of 36-bit memory; the latter ones had something like 1 MiB of 32-bit memory and something over 1 MFLOPS each. Your TI-83, on the other hand, has 32 KB of memory - a quarter the core memory of a 7094-II - and I can't imagine its 6 MHz Z-80 doing a double-precision floating point operation in under 20 cycles, which you'd need to match the 7094-II's performance. Don't even think about comparing your TI-83 to the Model 75 (and even *that* was outdated when NASA started receiving model 91 (that packed whopping 16 MFLOPS) tops when the first missions were going to Moon - obviously, they didn't upgrade mid-project).

Now considering NASA was doing all of Apollo by hand on a computer that was less advanced

You've got X years to get to the moon with no launcher, lander or capsule is the sort of project that requires shitloads of people. Once you've built on the shoulders of giants things get easier.

Later NASA was a victim of it's success as it became a parking lot for people like the Bush appointee aged in his mid 20s that started telling the scientists what to write. Large budgets attract people like flies, and people

The Epsilon rocket is three stages of solid rocket booster, like an ICBM. So there's no fueling on the pad, no plumbing, no cryogenics, and no turbopumps. The launch team has a lot less to do than with liquid-fueled rockets.

The big win with kerosene over LH2 is that kerosene is much denser, so a) your tanks can be smaller and b) it's much easier to generate high levels of thrust since you don't have to move as much liquid through your engine.

if you're pumping an oxidizer and control pumping of that then it's not really solid rocket... instead the oxidizer is mixed in.

now this of course has it's drawbacks as you can't just turn the rocket off if you want to or control the speed by controlling flow . and then there's accidents like this http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jul/27/local/me-explode27 [latimes.com] since the stuff is.. well, explosive to say the least.

The Epsilon rocket is three stages of solid rocket booster, like an ICBM. So there's no fueling on the pad, no plumbing, no cryogenics, and no turbopumps. The launch team has a lot less to do than with liquid-fueled rockets.

They're also proudly proclaiming how quickly they can prepare the rocket for launch. I don't think that these features are coincidental, and I don't think that cost savings are the only driver behind developing this thing. North Korea's leadership is a bit unstable at times, it may have nuclear weapons, and Japan has had North Korean rockets fly over its territory before. It's a serious potential threat to them.

Since they lost in WWII, Japan has been very pacifist, but in recent years it has begun to expand its military activities a bit, taking part in a UN peace keeping mission for instance. Outright developing an ICBM would probably go a bit too far at this point, but making a civilian rocket that can be launched at short notice with a small crew and has the range to hit North Korea could just be an acceptable compromise between mitigating the NK threat and not rocking the domestic political boat too much with overly aggressive military moves.

It's convertible to a STOVL carrier, so it could operate things like Harriers and F-35Bs, which are marginally less capable than the STOBAR (Short Take Off, BArrier Recovery) ship the PLAN has and dramatically less than the conventional CATOBAR (CAtapult Take Off, BArrier Recovery) ships the USN, Marine Nationale, and the Brazilian Navy has.

1 on the keyboard, 1 on the mouse, both share a screen? OR 1 is blind bu type very fast, the other have excellent eyes but no hands? OR You still need bags of water to setup the physical equipment... count from 10, etc.

"...you see a huge hoard of people launching a spacecraft, or massive ground support infrastructure, you are looking at obsolete technology."

I'm not so sure. I think what you're seeing is a public relations and media event. Really, how exciting would it have been to see any NASA launch with just a few engineers sitting around a table? People want to see the big board and lots of people wearing headsets sitting at workstations labeled with the subsystem name.

Or a highly experimental one, like the saturn five was, which is why it required so much support.The cutting edge requires more work which is why it requires more people. Established technology, like these solid rocket stages, is better understood so requires less people.

Thus I think you are getting it backwards although I'd substitute "ready for large scale production" for your "obsolete".

Anybody knows how the new commercial space launchers do in comparison?

Don't know about the current crop. But back in the late '80s AMROC controlled their launches without the classic room-full-of-custom-consoles. Instead they hacked up their "consoles" as a GUI on one instance of the state-of-the-art windowing interface computer of the time - a Macintosh (what they'd now call a "Macintosh Classic").

I hear that, when they showed up at Goddard for their test shot, the usual control room crew was standing a

I applaud them on bringing down the launch crew requirements. Space travel is never going to open up for the masses if you need thousands of personnel to launch 7 individuals every few months. But while this rocket is bringing down the requirements on one front its severely limiting the spacecraft capabilities on another. At least according to the info I can pull up the Epsilon rocket uses solid rocket fuel for pretty much every stage (except maybe the fourth optional stage). While I am sure that massiv

Team reduced from 150 to 8. The unlucky 142 remaining PhD will line up to become scientific journalists, producing rounds of papers about the latest molecule that will make us live longer, treat cancer, and/or obesity.